Rough Copy
The online magazine for creative writing, short stories and artistic expression.Category: Fiction
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Spaceship
Days after arriving in England, the doctor took her to the bunker,
calling it a spaceship-probably haunted, he said,
and that it used to be a morgue during the big war.
He showered over there and he pointed to a stall and said he went
running during lunch breaks.
He said she was the first to arrive. “One’s still on […] -
Outside the Window, Birds
The sea of spuming thought foists up again
The radiant bubble that she was. And then
A deep up-pouring from some saltier well
Within me, bursts its watery syllable.
–Wallace Stevens, “Le Monocle de Mon Oncle”
This morning, my husband yells at me. There’s nothing to do, I say. You could try doing the dishes, he says. He goes. I […] -
The Countdown as Seen from 2000 Feet Above
jyu (10)
You ask me to recount my death. Unimportant at this juncture, do you not think? Yes, well it was, after all, 1945, over fifty years ago.
It is “for the record”? How can records and statistics matter here. How can there be clerical mistakes in the most natural act of crossing over. Oh, not a […] -
The Power of Fiction
Usually in my fiction writing classes there’s a student with a critical streak who pipes up early on in the semester and says, “What’s the point of fiction?” And he or she will go into the whole litany we’ve heard ten or fifty thousand times before: most people read non-fiction only, movies and TV have […]
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Single White Cat
A cat could change everything!
Julie began, following this brainstorm, to look in the want ads and watch bulletin boards and visit the pound, that vile-smelling, heart-breaking place. Though she lived in a third floor Russian Hill flat, and was well-aware she would end up with one of those poor housebound creatures that flop around growing […] -
Our Problem
He’s here. On campus. A sophomore sees his Harley spin into the faculty parking lot. A grad sees him stomp toward the elevator in his combat boots. The department secretary races up to the sixth floor where we have gathered for our first faculty meeting of the semester. She rushes toward us, arms waving.
Impossible, we […] -
What We Always Say
A few days ago my father said, “I don’t think I’ll ever make art again.” His hair flew off his head at odd angles, and his face was gaunt with shades of grey and yellow. We were on the subway. I looked around at the other passengers, waiting for their reactions. A Dominican lady with […]
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My House
Mother says I am too old to play with dolls. I do not play with dolls. I haven’t played with dolls in years, and if they had bothered to take any notice they, SHE, would have known that. The dollhouse has always been my life’s project and has nothing at all to do with dolls.
Just […] -
Apples By An Open Window
“So I saw this new patient a few weeks ago. Very young.” Simon pincers the roach, hoots, then high-hands it across the pillow to me. When he exhales his mouth forms a slightly squashed O, as if he’s been chopped in the spleen or is lip-synching to some soulful Anita Baker number: “Ooo-ooh, ooo-ooo-ooh. You’re […]
by Heather McQueen
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